Moving it was nothing that a fridge mover and 4 friends didnt handle
I think I've actually moved fridges that weighed less.
Just realized that I didnt answer Daves question about where it came from. Kind of a long story. I first saw this about 20 years ago sitting, unused, in the basement of a building a friend took me to to pick up some stuff. On contacting the owner of the building he said he bought it several years before that at an auction but couldnt remember where. He didnt want to sell it as he had ideas of making it into a dust collector for his workshop.
Fast forward to two weeks ago. They are now cleaning out that building for some reason or other. I approached the owner again to ask if it was still there. He said he would check next time he was over there as he never got around to using it. About a week later he called to say it was still there. After some haggling we settled on a price of $75. I had to wait till today to get it though when some friends were free to help.
Now, just to jump back again. When I first saw it I took a couple of pictures of it. In doing some research I had previously found out that the Grayson Hall (A 36 room mansion), which was empty at that time had had a central vac when it was built in 1912. When it was converted into a restaurant in the early 1980's they removed the machine to make room for a walk in freezer. The machine itself was put on display, along with other antiques, in the Restaurant. When the restaurant closed it was sold in a closing out auction (suddenly 2+2 starts to equal 4). I showed the picture to one of the former restuarant owners and he was quite certain it was the same machine so I can say with a fair degree of certainty that it came from the Grayson Hall here in Moose Jaw.
I wish I could have gotten some of the outlets but, in the 90's when the house was renovated to become the head office of the Fifth Avenue Collection the contractor removed and disposed of them (against his instruction I might add) The new owner was not very pleased. Apparently the dumb contractor thought they were capped pipes from the old boiler, not vacuum connections.
I've included a picture of the Grayson Hall below that I took last summer.
Doug
